What is dark tourism? Travellers visiting war zones and disaster areas – here’s what we know

THEY are the sites of massacres, natural disasters and wars, but each year thousands of curious travellers are flocking to the macabre sites for holidays with nowhere off limits.

It's a phenomenon known as "dark tourism" - here's what you need to know.

What is 'dark tourism'?

Simply put, dark tourism spots are those that relate to death.

Whether the destinations be linked to untimely or violent deaths, the spots generally have political or historical significance.

The Institute for Dark Tourism Research (iDTR)'s Dr Philip Stone opened the world's first academic centre into the subject, saying the idea of tourists heading to sites considered more "macabre" often could help to understand how society felt about death.

He said: "Dark tourism can enlighten an understanding of how contemporary societies deal with and represent their significant dead.

"Ironically, therefore, dark tourism is concerned with death and dying, yet through its social scientific study and its empirical practice, dark tourism tells us more about life and the living."

He added that "moral boundaries and ethical relativity" were often questioned at the sites.

What kinds of sites are considered 'dark'?

There is a key difference between organised 'dark' tourist destinations, like the Auschwitz concentration camp that caters for tourists to learn about the site's World War Two history, and less formal sites such as the areas in Fukushima affected by the nuclear disaster.

Sites that accommodate curious tourists include museums in Cambodia that educate people about the Khmer Rouge regime, the Hiroshima Peace Park that immortalises the atomic bomb unleashed at the end of World War Two and Ground Zero, a memorial for the 9/11 attacks, in New York.

An estimated 1.7 million people were killed during the Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia while about 140,000 people killed or dying within months of the bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima.

About 3000 people lost their lives in the 9/11 terrorism attack in New York.

But other spots are less formalised, with tourists often travelling to war-torn areas of Iraq or venturing to cordoned off areas.

Others travel to Afghanistan, Egypt or Iraq in spite - or perhaps because - of different area's unmapped qualities.

Some estimates have suggested that 800,000 international tourists visited Iraq in 2013.

Is there any controversy around these kinds of destinations?

Some elements of dark tourism have been criticised, particularly around the behaviour of tourists while at the sites.

Tourists visiting sombre sites have been lampooned for smiling in a selfie.

Other spots, including war-torn areas, can be dangerous for tourists, adding an element of controversy to a planned trip.

Why do people visit these sites?

Dr Stone said that people throughout history had always travelled to sites of death, with the concept not new.

He said: "By implication of the term ‘dark’, there is an obvious and inherent suggestion that tourists who visit sites of death, disaster, or the seemingly macabre are somehow disturbed or ghoulish by their act of visitation.

"There has already been an attempt within the literature to create a ‘Dark Tourist Spectrum’, but I am afraid it falls well short of a comprehensive visitor typology. In short, I would argue that there can never be a so-called ‘dark tourist’ because motivations to visit particular sites will be so varied and visitor experiences will be laden with varying levels of emotional intensity, that to try and categorise visitors beyond simple parameters is all be futile.

"There are no dark tourists to dark tourism sites –only individuals who are interested in the social reality of their own life-world.”

Dom Joly, an English television comedian and journalist, even travelled to a number of off-the-beaten-track destinations for his book "The Dark Tourist".

Always having been fascinated by odd places, he headed to Iran, Chernobyl and North Korea.

Are there any 'dark tourism' hot spots in the UK?

West Midlands Police are hosting a £75-a-night Halloween sleepover in serial killer Fred West's old prison cell.

The "ghost hunting" event will take place at the notorious Steelhouse Lane lock-up in Birmingham which is now a museum.

West was held there before being transferred to the city's Winson Green Prison where he hanged himself in 1995.

An advert also boasts that gangsters from the Peaky Blinders - who inspired the BBC drama series - were banged up there in the 1920s.

The West Midlands Police advert says: “This event provides a unique opportunity to spend an entire night on a Ghost Hunting Mission within the Victorian Lock Up in Birmingham City Centre on Halloween.

“These cells were occupied by none other than the original Peaky Blinders, Fred West and many more. Be there if you Dare!”

The all-night experience starts at 7.30pm and includes ghost stories and tales about the cell’s most notorious criminals.

Visitors will sleep in 12ft by 12ft cells and are told to bring their own sleeping bags and pillows.

The event is for over 18s only and the ad stipulates that “no alcohol or drugs are allowed."

The home of serial killers Fred and Rose West was demolished two decades ago, after the bodies of nine young women were found buried beneath it.

But the site where it once stood, in Cronwell Street, Gloucester, has become a morbid tourist attraction – with thousands of people reportedly visiting the alleyway.

Chris Lloyd, a documentary maker from Cardiff, was determined to find out more about what drives this desire.

In his quest, the 30-year-old has visited more than 30 dark tourist locations around the world, including Ground Zero, the former site of the Twin Towers in New York, and Aberfan, where the mining disaster happened in 1996.

Among the people Chris spoke to was Gloucester resident Adrian Mitchell, who moved to the south-west city for work in 1998-99.

He told the cameras: "I really knew about Gloucester was the nursery rhyme of Doctor Foster stepping in a puddle and Fred West.

"The first thing I did was go out and buy a book on the subject, and get some background there.

"By the time I had moved here, the house had been demolished so there wasn’t anything actually to see.

"But just the curiosity of coming here and seeing where everything took place, and the fact that this was a normal street, and these were horrific crimes committed by someone who’s well known in the area, was just fascinating to me.

"I think obviously they knocked it down because it was such a big story, there was so much suffering and death there, and it going to attract interest and people who wanted to come and have a look, which they were trying to avoid.

"It’s a very residential area and if you’re a neighbour and you’re involved in any way or you were here at the time you’re probably sick to death of the interest."

Adrian doesn't see anything wrong with a bit of harmless curiosity, but added: "If you were doing a tour specifically to make money out of a murder site, if it was recent then I would be concerned about that."

In the documentary, a unnamed member of Chris' crew told the camera: "It’s odd to be here because I know this is such a famous place. And I’ve seen it in so many pictures and on the news.

"It’s kind of like being in a grave yard full of people I don’t know. I’ve got no connection to it really."